


What SHOULD have happened

by Pupuni



Category: Tangled: The Series (Cartoon)
Genre: Gen, Varian gets the help he needs
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-05-24
Updated: 2018-05-24
Packaged: 2019-05-13 06:09:31
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,083
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14743415
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Pupuni/pseuds/Pupuni
Summary: How the biggest plot twist of Tangled could have been avoided with some basic human decency.*Contain spoilers to season 1, happens after "a queen for a day"





	What SHOULD have happened

The people of Corona got rid of the last remnants of the snow and began to return to normal.  
Rapunzel saw Eugene's delegation enter the gate with her parents’ they were all safe. She felt a huge weight lifted from her shoulders. She run to hug everyone. She took a deep breath of relief. Her parents were ok, her boyfriend was ok, her friends were okay. It was over and everyone survived it.  
She wanted to return to the palace when she suddenly remembered:  
  
_Varian_.

  
How could she forget him? The last time she saw the boy, he was thrown out of the castle toward a deadly blizzard and his father was in danger. She has to make sure he was ok.

 

"Eugene, I have to go," Rapunzel said.  
  
"what? "Where to?" He asked.  
  
"Old Corona," she said, and began to walk.  
  
Eugene ran after her and touched her shoulder. "Wait, wait a minute blondie, what happened?"  
  
"It's Varian. During the storm, he came to ask for help. He said something about his father and the stones. Eugene, he begged on his knees and I refused to help him. I had to take care for the rest of the kingdom. But I can go  now. I have to make sure he's all right. Maybe he still needs help. "  
  
"are you sure? Maybe it's not as bad as it sounds, and maybe it already got solved. "  
  
"Eugene, I promised."  
  
He hesitated for a moment.

"I understand. I'll come with you."  
  
"what? No, you just came back from a snowstorm trip to save my parents. I can’t ask you to come with me to another adventure. you need to rest"  
  
"Rapunzel, you've just returned from a journey to save this entire kingdom. I won’t et you go all by yourself. "He cupped her face with his hand.  
  
Rapunzel's gaze softened: "What would I do without you?"  
  
"suffer from less headaches, probably."A voice was heard from behind them.  
  
They turned toward the source of it.  
Eugene looked at her disapprovingly.  
"What do you want, Cassandra?"  
  
"I heard part of the conversation and if you go, I go too.  
  
"I'm so glad I have friends like you," Rapunzel said, hugging them.  
  
"Yes, yes, come on, let's go. Varian needs us, "Cassandra said, disengaging herself from her embrace.

 

************

When they reached old Corona, they were horrified by what they found.  
The entire city was covered with sharp stones. Entire houses were implied, entire fields were abandoned. it was seems like there isn’t a living soul in that area.  
  
Rapunzel covered her mouth with her hand.  
  
"How did it happen?" Cassandra asked.  
  
"The boy was not kidding when he said it was serious," Eugene said.  
"Do you think the King knows about it?"  
  
"It can’t be, he would have told me," Rapunzel said. "We have to go tell him,  
  
Rapunzel approached one of the rocks and studied it closely, she watched it glowing as she brought her hair close. "It's all my fault.” She said, “I touched those rocks and now the whole city is ruined!"  
  
"Rapunzel we don’t know that for sure." Eugene tried to reassure her.  
  
"Well, it doesn’t matter who’s fault is this , we have to find a way to stop it," Cassandra said.  
  
“Varian's home is on the far side of town.” Said Rapunzel.

“How do we know if any of these openings will take us to the other side? We need a bird's eye view.” Cassandra sent her owl to fly between the openings,-  
  
They heard him hooting from one of the openings.  
  
"I think he found a way! Max, you keep watching”  
  
The horse answered with a neigh.

  
They made their way, trying not to be stabbed. Eugene barley made it throughout the rocks.

He grunted: “well! What a convenient, easy-to-navigate path your bird found, Cass. That is some owl you got there.”

“Hhh Thanks.” She said. "Oh, and by the way? He's also an attack owl. I taught him to go for the eyes first.”

“Of course, by some owl, I meant some very noble, very majestic, very non-eye-scratchy, did I mention majestic? Owl.”

They arrived at Varian’s house.

They didn’t notice the shadowy figure that watched them from afar.

“***********  
Rapunzel went into the basement, she ducked as a purple bomb almost hit her.  
  
"Watch out!" She cried.  
  
Various bombs began to be thrown from various spots around the room. Cassandra was able to repel some of them with her sword, Eugene pulled Rapunzel out of the path of another bomb. But it wasn’t long until they were caught in the purple goo.  
  
"Ah, I hate that stuff! What are we going to do now? "Cassandra tried to free her feet.  
  
Rapunzel gasped sharply. "Look,"  
The others turned toward him and Rapunzel looked.  
There, in the center of the room, was a huge amber crystal. At the center of it there was an elderly man holding a note in his hand.  
"Varian's father," she whispered.

  
Slow heavy footsteps came from the doorway, everyone turned and saw Varian coming out of the shadows.  
  
"Well well well, Look what we have here," he said, more bitter than Rapunzel have ever heard him.  
"What are you doing here, Princess?" He asked.  
  
“let us go, Varian!” Cassandra demanded. He ignored her.  
  
"We came to help," the princess said.  
  
his expression changed in Resentment: “now? It's too late now! "His voice broke. "Why didn't you come before? Why didn't you help me when I asked? If you had come maybe I could have save him! "  
  
"I couldn’t! Do You think if I could I wouldn’t have come? I had to stay, the whole kingdom needed me! "  
  
" _I_ needed you! You promised me.  
  
"Varian I couldn’t even save my own parents!"  
  
"What ...?" He asked in surprise.  
  
"They got stuck in the storm. All I wanted to do was to drop everything and go save them but I couldn’t! Eugene volunteered to go there himself and I could have lose him, too. So many people risked their lives today, I couldn’t drop everything for one person. No matter who. "  
  
Varian's expression changed completely. He looked vulnerable and desperate. "But ... you promised me." He clung weakly to his argument.  
  
"I know I promised, and I am here now. Sorry I couldn’t come earlier. Is there anything I can do to help? "  
  
Varian paused. He sighed, "Let's find out."  
  
“great… can you let us go now? "Eugene asked.  
  
Varian dripped a mixture that dissolved the purple goo.  
  
"What now?" Rapunzel asked.  
  
“maybe try to touch it.” Cassandra suggested to Rapunzel.  
  
"Yeah... I'm not sure it's such a good idea. Didn’t you say that the last time you touched one of those things, more rocks just popped out everywhere? "Eugene asked.

"Well, do you have any better solution?" She asked irritably.  
  
"No, but I'd rather to do something that won’t kill us all!"  
  
"Guys, stop fighting!" Exclaimed Rapunzel,  
"varian, what do you think we should do?" She turned to him.  
  
"You have some kind of connection to these rocks. I think you must try to touch it," he said.  
  
Rapunzel stepped over the crystal and reached forward slowly.  
  
"This is going to end badly," Eugene said, shrinking, preparing himself for what was about to happen.  
  
Rapunzel touched the crystal, her hair began to glow.  
Everyone looked expectantly.  
nothing happened.  
  
"Well, That didn’t work, "Eugene said, crossing his arms.  
  
Rapunzel let go of the crystal.  
  
Varian hit the crystal in frustration. "It didn't work! I can’t believe it. I have to find a way, I have to find it, I have to ... "He put his arms around his knees.  
  
Rapunzel sat beside him and spread her arm around him. "Hey, don’t worry, we'll find a solution."  
  
Cassandra studied the crystal closely. "This crystal is different from the other rocks. It looks like it’s made of amber. "  
She turned to him: "Varian, how did that happen?" She asked.  
  
Varian quivered, "I...i-it's all my fault!" He burst into tears. "These rocks were everywhere and I just wanted to find a way to stop them even though Dad told me not to because no one else did anything so I had to try something! And then an accident happened and the crystal started to grow and ... "He covered his face with his hands." It's all my fault. "  
  
"Have you tried to find a compound that dissolves the crystal?" Rapunzel asked gently.  
  
"I've been trying since I came back." He looked at her desperately. "I'm a failure, everything I've ever did messed up and hurt people. Everything I touch falls apart. All I wanted was to help, I wanted him to be proud of me. I was tired of seeing his disappointed look, sick of thinking I'd never be good enough. But I just made it worse, I'm a failure." His pet raccoon jumped on his shoulder and wrapped around his neck in an attempt to comfort him.  
  
"Hey, hey, kid. You're a lot of things but trust me you're _not_ a failure. "Eugene went down on his knees and sat down in front of him. "I didn’t think I could be more than a simple thief for almost my whole life, I thought I'd always be an outcast, and look at me now! We all make mistakes sometimes, you're still a child. You can still get better. And at least you're trying to help people, look at all the things you've invented, you're a genius! Your father has many reasons to be proud of you. "  
  
Varian smiled a little and wiped his tears.  
  
"We'll find a solution," Rapunzel said, "I promise."  
  
He looked at her skeptically.  
  
"We'll do whatever we can, Varian. Because that's what friends do," said Cassandra.  
  
He got to his feet and sniffed. "Thank you. I knew I can count on you. I'm sorry I was angry before, I know you can’t abandon the whole kingdom just to help me."  
He looked at Crystal with a determined look, you could almost see the gears spinning inside his brain as he tried to think of a solution.  
"Okay. What do we know about the problem? "He asked.  
  
"Sharp black rocks are popping up in random places in the kingdom for some reason," Eugene said, counting his fingers. "You can’t break these stones, you can’t uproot them, and they shine every time Rapunzel comes near them."  
  
"And what do we know about Rapunzel?" Varian asked.  
  
"She's a princess, she never wears shoes, she has a frog as a pet, she's the most amazing woman I have ever met"

Rapunzel blushed.

"Okay, seriously now," Cassandra said. "When Rapunzel and I went out of Corona and bumped into these rocks, she touched them. This made her hair grow back along its original length. Every time she touches a rock, a lot of rocks burst out of the ground in that area.  
  
"And it happened about half a year ago," Rapunzel said. "When did the stone problem start?"  
  
"A few months ago it began to spread in the city, but my father said he knew these rocks and that there were many things I didn’t know about them. He talked about it like it was something ancient."  
  
"Has he told you anything about them?" Cassandra asked.  
  
"No. He refused to tell me no matter how much I asked. He said he'd deal with it himself. "He folded his arms. "But the problem just got worse and I didn’t know what to do. I had to try something."  
  
"So now we have to try to find out what my connection to the rocks is," Rapunzel said. "If your father knew something about them, maybe he left behind something that can help us."  
  
"I brought those books," Varian pointed to a large, messy pile of old books. "I was looking for something that could dissolve amber. I didn’t find anything."  
  
"Have you been looking in all of those books?"  
asked Cassandra.

  
"I'm not sure, I wasn’t very organized..."  
  
"Well, let's go through them again, each one take a pile and see if we can find anything about the rocks," Rapunzel said.  
  
They sat there and checked books for about an hour with no results.  
  
"And how many books do you even have in this house? There are libraries with less books than here, "Eugene said wearily.  
  
He shrugged.  
  
Eugene picked up another pile books but lost his balance and fell, all the books scattered on the floor.  
“ugh…” He sat there and rubbed his head.  
  
“are you ok?!”

Rapunzel helped him up  
  
"Yeah... don’t worry blondie, I've had worse falls."  
  
"Why am I not surprised?" Cassandra asked.  
  
"Be careful with those books!" Varian cried, running toward the pile. He began to pick them up when he noticed a scroll inside on of them.  
  
"Hey, what's this?" Rapunzel asked.  
  
Varian shook the scroll and then tried unsuccessfully to open it. "It was inside one of the books, I don’t know how I missed it. But it’s not opening. "  
  
Eugene took the scroll from him and looked at it from all angles. "There's a lock here. You need a key for this scroll, but maybe I can break this lock. I have a lot of experience, you know "  
  
Cassandra looked at him scornfully.

"what? You should be glad that my amazing skills are being used for a good purpose! "  
  
Varian sat there thoughtfully and then got up and said, "I don’t think we'll have to break the lock." He ran out of the basement.  
  
Varian ran to one of the rooms in the house, the others ran after him and tried to avoid the sharp rocks that were in different parts of the house. He opened a wooden box and began to rummage it. He let out a cry of joy when he found what he was looking for.  
"I've been trying to figure out what was this key belong to been for years! Maybe it can work. "  
Eugene handed him the scroll and he tried to open it with the key. A click sound was heard and the scroll opened.  
Everyone gathered around him as he unfolded the scroll.  
Inside the scroll they saw a ripped painting. On one side there was a symbol of an orange sun and beneath it drops that led to a flower. On the other side there was a moon symbol and drops below it leading to the part that was torn from the page, but you could see the edges of painted black rocks.  
  
"The sundrop flower, of course!" Rapunzel said.  
  
"Do you think the flower can help my father?" Varian asked.  
  
"I think we found my connection to stones!" Exclaimed Rapunzel excitedly.  
  
"Wait, what?" Cassandra tried to understand  
  
Eugene also understood and answered: "As you probably know, Rapunzel was born with magical hair that was the reason she got kidnapped as a baby. The magic powers were passed to her at birth by her mother who had received them from the sundrop flower she had eaten to heal from her illness.”

  
"Do you have a point or do you just want to tell us what everyone already knows?" Cassandra asked impatiently.  
  
Eugene pointed to the flower in the scroll and said, "this is the sundrop." He pointed to the cut part of the scroll: "This part is ripped but you can still see that there are black rocks edges. The same black rocks that react to Rapunzel's magical hair. The flower somehow affects the rocks and therefore Rapunzel somehow affects them. problem solved!"  
  
"So why didn't it affect the amber?" Varian asked.  
  
"Maybe we should just try something else," Rapunzel said, letting down her hair.  
  
They went back to the Crystal.  
  
"Do you have an idea?" Cassandra asked.  
  
Rapunzel looked intently at the crystal: "I think we should we try to break it"  
  
Varian laughed. "Do you think I didn’t try?" He gestured toward a large pile of broken drills. "This thing is unbreakable."  
  
Rapunzel smiled mysteriously. "Do you know what else is unbreakable?" She asked, wrapping her hair around the crystal. She began to pull.  
  
"Of course!" Said Cassandra, helping Rapunzel pull. Eugene, Varian, Rudiger, and Pascal joined them.

Rapunzel's hair began to glow. Everyone pulled hard and the hair’s grip around the crystal tightened.  
  
"Come on... come on..." Varian muttered.  
  
The crystal remained the same. Rapunzel let go of her hair. She looked exhausted.  
  
"I can believe it didn’t work! I was sure we solved it. "He kicked the crystal angrily. All it did was to make his leg hurt.  
"What are we going to do now?" He asked in frustration.  
  
"Now we’re going back to the castle. It’s late. Cassandra said.  
  
"what? But we haven’t solved it yet! You can’t leave now. "  
  
"Varian, it’s late, we came here without saying anything to my parents, I'm sure they're worried sick," Rapunzel said.  
  
Eugene chuckled: "You think so? You really were a bit reckless. "  
  
"I didn’t think it would take so long, I was just worried about Varian."  
  
"Are you really going?" Varian asked sadly.  
  
"No." Rapunzel said. _"We're_ going,"  
  
"what?"  
  
"You're coming with us back to the castle."  
  
"Are you sure this is a good idea? We got into enough troubles already," Cassandra said.  
  
"do we have a choice? We can’t eave him here alone! His whole village had left, his house is covered with stones. There's no one to take care of him. "  
  
"I'm not a baby, Princess."  
  
"No, but you're still a child and I'm not leaving you here alone. You're coming with us "  
  
"But they won’t let me in, they still think I attacked you"  
  
" _You did what_?!" Cassandra and Eugene asked at the same time.  
  
Rapunzel rolled her eyes and put her hand on his shoulder. "When he came to the castle during the storm, he asked for help and the guards took him away because they thought he was ‘attacking me’. I will talk to them and explain that it was just a misunderstanding."  
  
"But what are we going we going to do with my father?"  
  
"We're not leaving forever, we'll be back another time. We can look for more ideas at home. Maybe my father can help, I should also tell him about the rock problem in old Corona. "  
  
"Thank you, really, your highness, for doing all this for me." He hugged her.

  
"That's what friends are for." She Hugged him back.

  
They walked toward the exit, and Varian took one last look at his father's crystal. _'I'll fix it_ ,' he thought. ‘ _I promise.'_

**Author's Note:**

> I just finished watching the series and I may be a *little* salty by how things turned out for Varian.


End file.
